


Bird's Song

by unifiedseperation



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, Dirk feels guilty, Guilt, Homestuck 2: Beyond Canon, Panic Attacks, Rose and Terezi are mentioned, uhhhhhh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:35:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25804468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unifiedseperation/pseuds/unifiedseperation
Summary: Ascension doesn't bring the immunity to emotions that Dirk hoped it would, and when the guilt of erasing his best friend hits, it's a lot to handle alone. But he's dug himself into this hole, and now he'll lay in it - and let the damned bury him, should the judgement be passed on his sins.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 15





	Bird's Song

Footsteps echo down the hall, the wood of his sandals making a distinctly different noise from the shoes of his companions. He walks fast, as if he has purpose in his steps and a goal in mind beyond coming out of this journey without killing himself a second time. It’s not that he dislikes the people he chose to travel with - it’s just that, well, they’re insufferable at their best and he can only tolerate so much. Apparently, ascension only grants clarity in your future, not the patience to make it there when your only human interactions are with a robot, and an alien that you’re fairly certain hates you. Which is fair - the robot doesn’t hate him, but only because it’s incapable of doing so.

He almost snickers to himself at the thought - that even his own creation would hate him,, if it could. It’s happened before, hasn’t it? Yes, many times. Familiar, red text comes to mind, snarky comments and heated back and forth that felt far too passive aggressive to be playful at times. The robot reminds him of it sometimes, but only in the fact that both tear into whatever material they can get their cold and unfeeling hands on as if they were feral animals, and his insecurities are the first meal they’ve had in ages. Though, it’s well deserved. He did sort-of kidnap one of them, and the other….well, he decides not to think about it. The past can’t be changed, not at this stage in the plan. Going back would ruin everything he’s worked for here, render every sacrifice meaningless, both during the Game and prior. And ignoring the impracticality of time traveling for such a small thing, he doesn’t think the AI behind that red text would appreciate it.

He stops, for a moment. It’s been an odd day for him, but he hasn’t thought about the AI in months. Not since he deleted every scrap of code for it, disposed of the shades, and left the apartment for the last time. But, standing in the hall of the ship, listening to the faint humming surrounding him that seemed deafeningly loud in that moment, he wondered if that had been a mistake. Had it been cruel to delete it? To remove it from existence without so much as a warning, and move on as if it hadn’t kept him sane for years while he was alone and frankly, vulnerable? Had he miscalculated something? It had seemed impractical to keep it around, at the time. It wasn’t going to affect the way of things in a way that was beneficial to the plan, and if anything it would’ve only been another annoyance on a trip he already wanted to be finished with.

But does that really justify what is, essentially, murder? 

His steps suddenly resume, faster than before. The hall of the ship is no place to debate the morality of deleting a sentient AI, first off, but he needs to be in his domain. Luckily, his quarters are nearby, and he slips inside and doesn’t bother locking the door behind him. The motions are familiar. Shoes off, shades on the bedside table as he sits on the mattress and closes his eyes. He takes a second to breathe, laying back slowly and bringing his arms up over his eyes. He feels the tightening of his chest and the fog over his thoughts, the familiar workings of an attack, and the scene around him shifts in his mind.

The man on the bed is no god, savior, or soldier. He is a child, a scrawny and malnourished teen that smells of the sea and has a permanent sunburn because half of his time is spent sitting on the roof and thinking, or sparring, or fishing, or any number of activities to keep him sane or alive. He is alone. The humming of the ship becomes waves beneath him, interrupted by the metal beams that somehow keep him from drowning in the seemingly bottomless, cold abyss that threatens him, constantly. He sucks in a deep breath, trying to ground himself, but it does nothing to ease the panic setting in. He wonders if that’s what the AI felt in the last few seconds of its existence that consisted of being deleted and possibly watching his creator do it with, seemingly, no hesitation. 

Did it feel the same fear he did during hurricanes? Drone attacks? The days and days without food that made him fear starvation? Did he become a monster to it? And what about the others - just how many atrocities has he committed that can be justified in the end?

He knows the answer is that everything he’s done is for a purpose. Logically, he’s right to do this, but logic doesn’t ground him as his reality melds with the panic settling itself in deeper, spreadings its grip and keeping him locked in like a prisoner awaiting the lethal dose that will bring justice for his victims, dead and alive. He is hopeless, trapped and alone, with no way to escape except accepting his punishment as it comes. He feels it should come now - it would be merciful, he thinks, to take him out while he’s in his own head. He is blind, in this moment. He wouldn’t see an attacker, nor would he hear them over his own heartbeat in his ears. He’s had these attacks before, but it’s never been so bad that he lost his grip on reality like this.

It’s pathetic, he knows it. He’s a god. He’s ascended, even, and yet here he is crippled by blind panic and guilt over something he has no reason to be so upset by. He tries to use this to get back up, to at least calm the pounding in his ears, and turns onto his side and curls into himself. Fine, then. He’ll wait it out. He tries to focus on his breathing instead of the onslaught of voices, of memories of the AI and their vulnerable moments. Human moments, despite its lack of body, emotion and expression. Memories of just how evolved it had become and how much of a person it had been. And how he had effortlessly wiped it all away, removed it from existence in this timeline like a spelling error now corrected. That should have been a comfort, but instead, all it does is continue to close the coffin he’s built for himself about this.

His attempts to wrangle himself back together feel tiring and pointless, shame settling in alongside the slurry of emotions that make him feel like he’s being torn apart at the very seams. No, beyond the seams - he’s being shredded, every aspect of his being put under the microscope to be judged. He rolls, again, and this time forces himself up just to be met with a wave of dizziness that makes him blink and try to steady himself with your hands. He can’t be so vulnerable, not like this. He isn’t a scared, scrawny teenager anymore. He’s a god, an unstoppable force, the change that has to happen to keep the balance of the game and restore the story. He doesn’t have time to panic like this, nor the energy to ride it out like he might if he were still in that apartment, or in a secluded spot where he could let himself be vulnerable like that, just for a second.

No. He doesn’t have that luxury, and he can’t...run away from this. He forces his expression to calm, forces himself into a mask of calm and conviction in his actions. On the outside, he doesn’t need to show anything. He’s picking up his pieces again, forcing them together whether they like it or not, whether he likes it or not. He doesn’t have the time for this. 

His hands shake as he grabs his shades, and when he stands he wobbles. But he makes it to his desk, sitting down and looking out the window behind him. The AI is gone, unsavable. The damage is done, and the only one that remains to feel the results is him. No one else knows, the AI can’t feel it, and he….

His own feelings don’t matter. He swallows, gripping the chair tight enough to make his knuckles go white. It doesn’t matter. He shouldn’t be guilty. He repeats it to himself, staring quietly into the void of space he’s currently travelling through, until he feels his heart slowing to a normal pace. His head aches, now, but he’s in control again. The guilt is eating at him slowly, in the background. He can ignore it until he’s done, push it away until it’s no longer a concern or he has a chance to let it destroy him for a few hours. He can play in his own pity party after he’s done saving the entire timeline, no - the entire game. 

He stands, ignoring any remnants of his guilt-fueled panic. He sees it in the distance - their destination grows closer, and he needs to prepare. He leaves the room entirely, as stone-faced and closed off to the world as he was when he entered a few hours prior.

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't written fanfiction since I was 13 and horny for nurses. Anyways, I love Dirk as a character and feel many aspects of his character are looked over in fiction. Not only this but people rarely write the emotional tolls he might experience, over the course of HS2, so I wanted to write something where he feels guilty. For me, delayed guilt comes in heavy, sudden waves. It's a little project-y of me to use my experience and push it onto Dirk, but he strikes me as someone who would experience it like that, too. Like he pushes everything to the side for the "greater good" so to speak, and it comes back to bite him when he finally lets himself relax, even a small amount.  
> So, yeah. Feel free to leave criticism in the comments.


End file.
